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The Gachagua impeachment drama unfolded as a clash of strategies. President William Ruto amassed the numbers in the two Houses of Parliament and pursued a surgical impeachment strategy to remove his second-in-command from power. Out-numbered, Rigathi Gachagua resorted to a populist counter-strategy targeting both the ‘court of public opinion’ and the ‘Courts of law’, addressing public forums, media and parliament and petitioning courts across the country. This clash of strategies has tested Kenya’s democracy in a public and a palpable way.
On October 17, 2024, Senate impeached Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua. This was hardly a jolt from the blue. After the Gen-Z revolt, President William Ruto pursued an impeachment strategy to replace his second-in-command. Using the evershifting elite alliances, he formed a ‘broad-based government’ to secure the numbers he needed to execute the strategy in parliament. In response Gachagua crafted a counter-strategy to scuttle Ruto’s impeachment strategy in courts. His legal strategists exploited a serious lacuna in Kenya’s new impeachment law. Unlike the America Senate which acts like a high court during impeachment and its verdict is final, Kenya’s Senate is merely a tool of inquiry with no legal force to convict. This leaves the judiciary as the final arbiter in county and national impeachment processes.
In the end, the impeachment drama has become a clash of strategies in the battle for the soul of Mount Kenya. Gachagua impeachment reflects the failure by Kenya’s 2010 Constitution to exorcise ‘the curse of the deputy’ in Kenya’s political system. Of Kenya’s five presidents, only Uhuru Kenyatta has finished his term with one deputy. Gachagua becomes the first deputy President to be impeached under the2010 Constitution, only 766 days in office. But Gachagua is also facing the full force of Ruto’s long-term strategy that also fell Kenyatta in 2022. Ruto’s long walk to September 13, 2022 when he was sworn in as Kenya’s fifth President reveals a consummate warrior and strategist.
Despite decades of animosity and even violence, Ruto recognized Mount Kenya, more than a quarter of Kenyan vote, as a potential ally to his Kalenjin bloc. Patience was Ruto’s safest ship to power. Even when his closest allies were removed from Government on allegations of corruption in March 2015, he kept his eyes on the larger picture and steered clear of confrontation with Uhuru, continue holding the Deputy President’s office to solidify his power